§ Mrs. Gillian ShephardTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what plans he has to pay additional compensation to severely disabled war and industrially injured pensioners who lost significantly more than £8 as a result of the error in the calculation of the retail prices index.
§ Mr. ScottI explained to the House on 18 December that we would be paying additional compensation to severely disabled war and industrially injured pensioners who have lost significantly more than £8—the amount of the special payment made in February. Losses over £8 incurred by these two groups range from nothing at all to some £60 over the full two years affected by the error—April 1987 to April 1989.
We have decided to make additional special payments to everyone in these two groups whose loss exceeds £8 by £10 or more: that is, by more than about 10p a week over the full two years affected. The ranges of loss in excess of £8, the weekly benefit entitlements to which they relate and the amounts of additional payments are shown in the table. The relationship between loss and weekly benefit 827W entitlement is not the same for both groups; this is because war pensioners can receive several additions to benefit which were not affected by the error.
We expect to start making these additional payments in September.
£s War pensioners (weekly entitlement) Industrially injured pensioners (weekly entitlement) Loss exceeds £8 by between Amount of additional payment Over 230 — 50–60 55 Between 190–230 Over 170 Between 40–50 45 Between 150–190 130–170 30–40 35 130–150 115–130 20–30 25 100–130 100–115 10–20 15